Pythia Adalinda
Pythia Adalinda [she/her] in the daughter of the Serpent Queen, the central villain in the Singing Springing Lark. A politically-minded villain, Pythia intends to run her kingdom like the corporation it is -- and doesn't mind the villainy in her tale, since it promotes trade with the kingdom and international renown. Because of this, she's a very cheery, upbeat princess, with a very stubborn sense of honour. Character Personality Externally, Pythia is very cheery, very polite. She's a Student Council member, for Grimm's sake, she's here to serve and to be forever helpful to her fellow students. There's rarely a moment where she's not smiling, or talking about how she's going to improve things at Ever After High. After all, antagonist role aside, she is a queen, and a queen is meant to serve her people. This external personality isn't fake. Pythia is, genuinely, a very sweet and idealistic person. She's excited for her destiny (for any villainy, she gets away with not even a snap on the wrist), and has very few things to regard as "bad" to happen to her in her life. Because of this, Pythia often struggles to relate and empathise with her peers, and isn't sure why they can't maintain the same happiness that she has. As someone who has really benefited from the system -- literal royalty, gets away happy with riches at the end of her tale, from a prominent author (Brothers Grimm) --, Pythia is fond of the world she inhabits. She has a strong belief that everything turns out all right in the end, and that everyone gets their just-deserts. If you deserve happiness, you'll be happy, she believes, and if you aren't, you'll be happy in the end. Due to this, Pythia actually puts a lot of trust in authority. She believes in the system, and believes that since it's worked for so many years and generations, there must be a reason why. She thinks Raven Queen's Rebel Movement is a mistake: it's thrown a cog where there shouldn't be, and now destiny is out of control. Although Pythia fears this slightly, once again, she believes so much in the world working out and always ending alright, and she knows that her own story is safe, so she worries only a little. For multiple reasons (such as her role in her story, or the fact that she's queen, or her corporate mindset), Pythia views herself as a bit of a hero or saviour. She exuberates positivity, and hates the idea that she's doing anything wrong. Because of this, Pythia finds it difficult to take criticism or to accept that something is going badly in her life, because things never go badly for Princess Pythia Adalinda. Additionally, she has a corporate mindset: considering wealth an indication of success and stability, and that her work as a villain "creates fairytale roles" - it's socially and economically beneficial! This little pedestral that she puts herself on is obviously an indication that honour plays a huge part in her life. Pythia is proud of the kingdom she's from, and the corporation she's destined to run. She loves the trade associated with her rule, she loves everything that she does in destiny. When she talks about her academic or extracurricular achievements, she beams with pride. Without a doubt, she will go great lengths at defending this honour. Usually, this takes the form of words and debate. Pythia is competitive and righteous, and would rather argue her point until victory, rather than "agree-to-disagree". However, she is aware that she's not always able to argue logically. Pythia is sometimes seen to be straight up deflecting topics or conversations she doesn't want to engage in. Don't ask, don't tell, basically. She either wants one out of two things: 1) to be correct; or 2) to maintain civility. And if she can't prove herself in the former, then she will opt for the latter, without question. Still, overall, Pythia is friendly. She's nice, she's always out there attempting to be helpful. Her heart is in the right place, and she acts with the belief that she's spreading happiness or kindness or a set future. Appearance Pythia has brown skin, and wide, dark ambery-purple eyes. She's rather short and cute-looking, with round cheeks and dimples. Her hair, which is so dark that it looks purple, is incredibly curly and volatile. She likes to keep it neat and tidy with pigtails and headbands in her daily/basic outfits, but in special occasions, will hold it in with crowns and pins. She carries herself with energy and laughter. Pythia's natural sweetness reflects in her actions, but sometimes a little too forcefully, so she comes off as bold and maybe a bit over-confident as well. Hobbies & Interests From her hextra-curriculars, Pythia is clearly very dedicated to her future job as the head politician of a kingdom that is based around trade. As someone ardent to do her civic duty, she strives to carry it out smoothly, which means getting as much experience as she can as a ruler and as essentially a CEO. In other words, she has a faetastic resume. Student Council A senator on the Royal Student Council, Pythia takes her role very seriously. Despite being both antagonist and villain, being a queen that ends her story without any negative consequences means that she is often not treated like a villain by many students, gaining enough trust to serve on the board. As a senator, Pythia does a lot of talking, a lot of campaigning, and a lot of getting people to sign petitions. She hosts a lot of bake sales and awareness events for several causes. She is very proud of her role, and often has a tendency to talk at length about it. This is how most people would recognise her face on campus. Debate Pythia is a speaker in the Premier Division of the Ever After Debate Society, and has been since her first semester at Ever After High. She's very close to her team, and spends a lot of time outside of Debate hanging out with them as well. Model UN She is very fond of Model United Far, Far Away Lands. Dragon Games Outside of political stuff, Pythia does do things for fun, the most significant of those is Dragon Games. An avid supporter of the reintroduction of the sport to Ever After, she immediately jumped on the chance to join a team once slots opened up. One thing though - she's getting really sick of the joke "haha, are you a dragon rider or are you the dragon", but will laugh at it when it's made, as if she'd never heard it before. Other *She keeps one of her childhood favourite Barbie dolls in her room, which is Barbie as the Chancellor, on a shelf. The Barbie is wearing a suit and looks very dapper. Fairy tale – The Singing Springing Lark How it Goes Wikipedia link How does Pythia come into it? The Serpent Queen was not very fond of the prince, and was relieved once her story was over and she could finally marry her childhood sweetheart, who had adopted a young Pythia Adalinda, and the Queen and Consort could finally raise their daughter together. There's not much to say: Pythia lived a pretty blessed life as a princess in a royal court, where riches and extravagance was everywhere and there was little harm that could come in her way. Opinion On Destiny Oh, Pythia loves it. She was brought up to love it, and brought up to regard villainy as something necessary for the world, for if there were no villains, how would the story even begin? Because of this, she sees her role as incredibly important. Nothing bad or of harm comes to her in her story. In fact, she ends up with a pretty golden dress and plenty of cute little blue chickens, and maintains her crown and throne and everything else she has. There's nothing to complain about. Clearly, Pythia is someone who has been blessed by the system, and has had everything work out in her favour. As stated in her Personality, destiny and fate is something that she believes in highly, and thinks that the Storybook of Legends was important, that it maintained order and rigidity to roles. She's very angry at Raven's Rebel Movement, and believes that Raven didn't think of any consequences outside the immediate ones. Without a doubt, she aligns Royal. Parallels *The Serpent Queen did not care that the lion prince escaped, as she got the blue chickens in return. For this reason, I decided to make a pun on the fact that she preferred "chicks to princes" - Pythia has two mothers. *The Serpent Queen has an obsession with riches and pretty items. I always imagined her kingdom as a kingdom of trade and whatnot, so I made Pythia very corporate-minded. *Pythia has proficiency in caring and calming beasts, just as the Serpent Queen was able to control and fly the griffin, and fight the lion prince. *A bit of a subversion: the Serpent Queen gives the lion prince a sleeping potion. Pythia, however, is against the use of love potions and sleeping potions, or any potions that alter someone's mental/physiological state. It's one of the social justice movements that she's passionate about. Quotes Trivia *"Pythia" is a reference to pythons (a type of snake); "Adalinda" means noble serpent. **''Pythius'' was also the name of a Lydian king, and hence the name Pythia could be seen as a suitably royal name. *In real-world terms, Pythia would be from Ulm, Germany. **Ulm is a city traditionally known for industry and economy - a perfect fit for a kingdom based around trade. *Socially, Pythia is definitely very left and progressive. Economically, however, Pythia is more conservative and capitalist. **"Liberal, but not leftist" might be an apt description. Category:Characters Category:Females Category:Zena's OCs Category:The Singing Springing Lark Category:Royals Category:German